Summary:

The Honeywell HHT-080 HEPA Clean Tower Air Purifier is one of Honeywell’s most popular tower air purifier models given its cheap price and decent performance. It is an okay air purifier for basic concerns such as allergies and dust.

Its tower fan style saves on space and its forward blowing airflow also makes it useful for doubling as a tower fan.

As with most Honeywell purifiers, this unit offers simple features and a basic filter. This tower air purifier is not advertised as being a HEPA air purifier and our efficiency tests show an unsatisfactory 58-66% removal rate for particles greater than 0.3 microns.

For larger particles, the efficiency results are in line with the performance claims made on the box. This make the HEPA-Clean Tower a decent unit for large sized dust and allergen particles.

Full Review of Honeywell HH5-080 HEPAClean Tower Air Purifier

Unboxing the Unit

Color Did Not MatchThe first thing that was apparent when unpacking the unit is that the color did not look the same as it did on the box. The box images, and ones used online make the unit look like there are two shades of gray, light and dark. The color is more an off-white and grayish brown. While the color is irrelevant to its performance as a unit, it feels less neutral than the graytones I was expecting.

Basic Knob ControlsThe HEPA-Clean tower uses the same style of power configuration as most other Honeywell units: A simple knob that clicks to one of 3 various speed settings. Basic and functional. I don’t expect this piece to fail any time soon.

Changing the Filter Is pretty simpleAs with most tower air purifiers, the filter is contained in the back, and the back grill pops off to reveal it.

With the HEPA-Clean Tower, the switch/clip to push down on was not immediately apparent and I had to push forcefully in a few areas before finding it. Once you do it once though, you likely won’t have any issues with it in the future.

Honeywell has switched most of its filters to a few select sizes. Units now stack two or three filters so that Honeywell has fewer skus to maintain.

Standard filter sizes that get used in multiple unit models should mean that replacement filters should be available for a long time into the future, as new units will be produced using existing filter shapes and styles.

Directional Airflow Problem If you are expecting to also use this unit as a tower fan for its directional airflow, you are in for a bit of a surprise. Due to the way the cylindrical fans spin inside of the unit, the air does not come out straight but blows to the side.

This is common in lower priced tower fans and air purifiers because no effort is taken to correct the airflow direction. Slightly more expensive units like the Alen T500 have compensated for the angular spin of the fans with some internal baffles that correct the direction of airflow.

Construction Quality Seems Good for The Price The plastic feels quite solid and thick and the unit feels rather durable. The matte finish on the unit means that it won’t leave visible fingerprints and smudges from handling.

This tower pivots at the bottom and has an oscillation feature. However, this base of the tower feels a little wobbly and the air purifier can rock around a bit when handling it.

Key Technologies

The Honeywell HHT-080 Tower utilizes mainstream fan and filter technology. It does not have any particularly innovate or unique technologies that we are aware of and at the price point, we wouldn't expect it to.

Available Filter Options

As with all budget units, filter options are pretty basic. The HHT Tower uses a plain HEPA-type filter as well as an optional charcoal/carbon pre-filter.

The pre-filter that comes with the unit is a standard sponge/mesh filter. It will capture some large dust particles and hair to keep it out of the main filter. The pre-filter that was included with the unit was not a charcoal pre-filter. However, charcoal/carbon pre-filters are available for purchase separately.

Product Specs

Performance Testing

The following performance specs are what we measured in our performance testing.

Speed

Power Consumption (Watts)

Noise (dB)

Efficiency (0.3 Microns)

Efficiency (1 Micron)

3

86

64.5 (loud)

60.4%

90.9%

2

54

58.5

58%

84.6%

1

35

50.5

66%

84.4%

These test results indicate that the unit is loud and consumes more power than similar tower air purifiers. It's efficiency also quite poor at 0.3 microns, which the smallest sized particles we measure. Because of the poor 0.3 Micron performance, we also tested at 1 micron, and the unit did somewhat better.

Based on the results of our tested, we recommend that you upgrade to a slightly better air purifier model. Honeywell has several tower models that perform better than this one, and there are additional towers across other brands that provided added performance for an increased cost.

Cost to Operate

The Honeywell HEPA-Clean tower is a budget priced unit. This makes it easy for the majority of people to afford and is one of the reasons it sells so many units. However, despite the low entry cost, it is actually going to be more costly to operate than some of the slightly more expensive units in its class.

In order to determine the cost to operate, we consider power consumption cost and filter replacement costs:

Power Consumption Cost

Unit Power on High:

86 watts

Cost of Electricity from Utility:

15 cents/kWh

Your Daily Power Cost on High:

31 cents per day

Your Monthly Power Cost on High:

$9.30/month on high

Filter Replacement Cost

Filter

Cost

Change Frequency

HEPA Filter- Type C

$33.99 for 2 pack

2 every 6 months

Charcoal Pre-Filters- Type B

$24.99 for 2 pack

1 every 3 months

Power Cost: Running the Honeywell HHT-080 on high speed, 24 hours a day will result in a power cost of $9.30/month.

Filter Cost Changing your HEPA filter every six months, and your carbon pre-filter every 3 months will cost about $118/year, which averages out to about $10.41/month in filter costs.

Your maximum operating cost is based on the assumption that you run your unit on high, 24/7 and change the filters at the maximum recommended frequency. Although we recommend this for maximum performance, we expect that you will not always run it on high, or will not run it 24/7. Therefore, we divide the maximum operating cost ($19.70) in half to give a more typical monthly operating cost of $9.85.

The Honeywell HHT-080 is a low priced air purifier with relatively high coverage area. However, compared to two higher priced competitors, the noise levels, and cost of ownership is much higher.

If you have it in your budget, higher priced units such as the Whispure 400 or the Alen T500 can provide better performance, lower long term cost of ownership, and better warranties.

Areas for Improvement (The Bad)

NoiseNoise is an area that does not get a lot of attention. This is because most people in the market for an air purifier don’t tend to think of noise as an issue until after they own the product and realize how loud it is. The unit we tested also produced a noticeable hum from the motor. It sounded like there was a dull grinding, maybe from poor bearings in the motor itself. This is really only noticeable if you are within 3 feet of the unit, which is probably not likely for most people. However, this product delivers reasonable performance on medium speed and the noise is comparable to other units tested.

Airflow Angle We analyzed this above. The air does not blow directly out of the unit as one would expect.

Reasons to Buy (The Good)

This is a good budget unit for allergy and dust concerns. If you’re choosing between a high end unit that you can’t afford to run regularly or change the filters for, or this lower performance model which is cheaper to maintain, go with the one that you will be able to afford to use the most often. However, take a close look at the cost to operate and think about how frequently you will be changing the filters. Many slightly higher priced units are actually cheaper to operate

We primarily recommend higher end air purifiers, but when it comes to cleaning your air, any air purifier is better than no air purifier. And since no one really expects to find BMW performance at a Kia price, the budget priced Honeywell HEPA-clean tower will likely meet the expectations of most people who buy it.

Why Buy With Air Purifiers America

With a hundred places you could buy this same product, why choose Air Purifiers America?

With Air Purifiers America, you always have someone to call if you run into a problem.

We can give you advice over the phone or online chat. Help you determine where and how often to run your unit. Help you find the right filter replacement, and more!

If you need to send the unit back, we've got you covered. If your unit has an issue in a year, we can walk you through the warranty process.

Amazon may ship it to you 1 day faster, but after that, you're on your own! When you buy from Air Purifiers America, we are always available to help you resolve any issues you may have.